


A Chronological Exposition on Envying Schrodinger's Cat

by Albuss



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Eating Disorders, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Falling In Love, Fluff, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Self-Destruction, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-21
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:21:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27140345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Albuss/pseuds/Albuss
Summary: Much seemed as if it had never changed. The house tables were set, classes were in session, and Harry Potter was following Draco Malfoy. Except things had changed. Everything had changed. It was mid September and the dinner conversations were so sparse that oppressive silence greeted Harry just a few meters beyond the doorway. Seats were saved that would never be filled. All the color in the world had blurred together, and then faded to gray.Or, a story in which 2 very damaged people manage to make their own light.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 8
Kudos: 148





	1. An Exercise in Apathy

**Author's Note:**

> I’ll start by giving a massive trigger warning. This story contains explicit characterizations of self-harm, eating disorders, and depression. Proceed with caution and take care of yourselves.  
> I will also note that this is a story about two men in a relationship written by a bisexual female. I am in no way trying to fetishize or sensationalize the experience of gay or queer men and instead chose to write this pairing because I find it to be the most complex and interesting of HP ships, regardless of gender.
> 
> This story is nothing new, and contains pretty much every drarry trope imaginable. I wanted to write a version of all the stories I most like reading, but portrayed depression more similar to the ways I have experienced it. So massive thank you to all the other fan writers out there. I am not particularly creative, and most of this fic is drawn from either personal experience or stories I have read before. The story focuses mostly on Draco, Harry, and their relationships with themselves and each other, but it felt weird to leave the Golden Trio out, so there’s a healthy bit of Hermione and company in there too. I tried to make the whole thing feel natural, sweet yet complicated and healthy yet believable, but I think a little bit of cringe is inevitable, so bear with it and take it for what it is. 
> 
> I do not claim any of the characters, world building elements, or circumstances as my own, and all of that belongs to JK Rowling and the Harry Potter fandom as a whole.  
> Lastly, this is the first piece of fiction I’ve written in the last 5 years, and my very first fanfic ever. So be kind.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

Malfoy had left dinner early again, dashing from the Great Hall with none of the poise and purpose of his younger self but all of the suspiciousness. Harry waited a moment before getting up to follow, excusing himself to Ron and Hermione with a stomach cramp and creeping away into the darkened corridors.  
Hogwarts was almost entirely rebuilt. The Astronomy Tower was closed off and the Ravenclaws had been relocated to the dungeons, their portion of the castle having been deemed unlivable. The magical repair teams worked weekends to finish repairs, but much seemed as if it had never changed. The house tables were set, classes were in session, and Harry Potter was following Draco Malfoy.  
Except things had changed. Everything had changed. It was mid September and the dinner conversations were so sparse that oppressive silence greeted Harry just a few meters beyond the doorway. Seats were saved that would never be filled. All the color in the world had blurred together and then faded to gray.  
Still, old habits were hard to break. Harry found Draco slumped against a wall, knees drawn in and breathing hard.  
“Fuck do you want, Potter?”  
Even the sting of his drawl sounded different. The venom was diluted. He seemed broken,  
“You want the truth, Malfoy?” Harry responded, “I don’t want anything. Following you is the most consistent thing in my life right now. May as well continue. It’s comforting.”  
Malfoy scowled, his pointy features making the shadows of his face look sunken.  
“Good for you, Potter. Feel better now that you've successfully darkened my day.”  
“I don’t give a shit about your day, Malfoy.”  
Malfoy gave a bitter laugh.  
“And here I thought I had gotten under your skin. Of all the people I’ve ever tried to make pay attention to me, I thought you were the one I succeeded at. But I’m just another game, huh? Didn’t think you were that smart. Is it a control thing? Because I notice you never wear short trousers? Or light colored ones? Is that also a control thing?”  
Harry froze. How did he know? There was no way he could know.  
“You're succeeding now,” he ground out, “One more word and you're done. I’m warning you Malfoy.”  
“You’re the one who’s stalking me,” Malfoy muttered, but Harry had already disappeared towards Gryffindor tower.

It had been 4 days since Potter had followed Draco during supper, and the Gryffindor hadn’t worn short sleeves since. It was a shame, really. He had nice arms. Lean and muscular and heavily veined as though from dehydration. Draco knew why, too. Every night, Draco snuck from the dungeon and out a side door to find Potter alone on the grounds, going through the movements of a work out. Apparently neither of them could sleep, so Draco would just sit in the cold and watch Potter lift and crunch until he collapsed, clammy and half awake. He never saw Draco, and no one else ever found them. It was Draco's secret. Only he knew why Potter always looked gaunt and tired. Only he knew why his chest and shoulders and arms were filling out despite that. He knew what Potter’s screams sounded like when the nightmares woke him. He had seen the deep cuts on his legs and shins reopen and fester. He had seen them multiply. Potter breathed chaos. His mannerisms, twitching and uncontained, had used to infuriate Draco to no end. Somewhere along the line, though, between when he first started to break and when Potter did, he began to find it fascinating.  
Charms was just ending and the 8th and 7th years were crowding the door as they were dismissed. Draco was the only one not moving to leave. It was the last class of the day, and he was awaiting the arrival of his overseeing auror and Headmistress McGonogal to discuss his schooling and the terms of his parole. In what he supposed was carelessness, Potter brushed by his desk, purposefully ignoring Draco’s presence.  
“Is it because of me? Because of what I said? The reason you're wearing sleeves?”  
Harry looked at him like a deer in the headlights, cocking his head and then rushing for the door. Draco wasn’t sure what had compelled him to speak. His head was fuzzy, but he had convinced himself it was clear. He hadn’t eaten since yesterday and the world inside his brain was beginning to blur out of reality.  
That night, when he watched Potter pull off his invisibility cloak in the grass and run in circles until his face finally lost the lines of claustrophobia and grief, Draco started to cry.

Malfoy had been wrong. If he hadn’t been under Harry’s skin before, he certainly was now. The boy looked like a walking corpse, and, curiosity piqued, Harry tracked his every move. He was wan and pale. He trembled when he walked. At the few meals he went to, he pushed food around on his plate and stared into space. During class, he studied quietly and spoke to no one.  
As he thought Malfoy's strange behavior over, Harry wandered the halls of Hogwarts. He had a free period and no interest in spending it in an empty common room. Usually, he would have stayed in bed, but he was exceptionally restless and nothing seemed to be easing it.  
As he paced through the North Tower, Sir Cadogen shouted his name from his place in the painting above the landing.  
“Sir Potter, it is a mighty pleasure,” The knight exclaimed, bowing so low that his ill-fitting helmet rolled onto the grass with an uninspired clunk, “Your deeds precede you. A true honour. Do stay. We may trade tales of heroism.”  
“Come off it,” Harry yelled back, skin prickling.  
Sadness and anger and heaviness threatened to strangle him and he rushed onward, not knowing where he was headed. A wall up ahead was partially destroyed, roped off where it had not yet been repaired. Harry ducked under the tape and kept walking.  
Then he froze. He’d been here before. He could see, suddenly, Percy and Ron crouched in front of him, hear the sound of rubble settling and sense the thick dust and crackling magic that hung in the air. Clear as the present, he saw Fred lying still, blood spilling out of him but the stream already slowing.  
A choking sob rose in Harry’s throat. He tripped in his haste out of the hallway, glancing back with wide eyes as he stumbled around a corner and towards the nearest loo. Slamming and locking the door, he panted, weight held up by the bowl of a sink. Mustering the guilt and the loathing and the loss, he punched the mirror. Hard. It shattered around him; into the sink, on the floor, in Harry’s hair and scraping his face. He picked up a shard, turning it over in his hand, and shoved the sleeve of his shirt up.  
The first jagged cut was all anger and force and self loathing. The second was bliss. And then the door of the bathroom was forced open, and silver gray eyes were on him as he bled onto the damp concrete. The irony was not lost on him.

When Draco disgruntledly removed 4 layers of locking spells from the boy’s bathroom door, he had not necessarily expected to find Harry Potter. A group of brawling third years, maybe, or a even a couple of horny students fucking in the corner, but not Harry Potter, back to the door and body pressed against a sink basin. He was surrounded by shattered glass, shards reflecting harsh light into Draco’s eyes from where they lay at Potter’s feet. The white of the ceramic edge of the sink was marred by thick garish drops of blood, and Draco watched as they slid down the sides of the bowl and onto the floor.  
“Well Potter,” Draco drawled, “This is really a whole new level of obsession for you. I’m flattered, but I’ll tell you that you're not the first to try and copy me.”  
Potter spun halfway to face him, hiding his right arm against his side. His pupils were wide, and surprise unguarded. As recognition registered on his face, his expression hardened, but his breathing still came in sharp pants. He held a piece of mirror in his fist so tightly that it was surely breaking skin.  
“Do me a favor then and help me finish the act then, Malfoy. Go on. I’m sure you’ve been waiting to dispose of me for half our lives,” Potter said listlessly.  
For the first time that Draco could remember, Potter seemed too tired to engage. The combative fire was gone from his eyes and he just sighed and looked away, apparently uninterested in juvenile banter. Draco envied his apathy. The more defensive Draco got the more he seemed to want to talk.  
“I’d love to, Potter, but see, I was never a real Death Eater. Just a kid who would never have been taught such cruel curses. I’m helpless really, don’t have it in me.”  
Using Potter’s own words against him was a low blow, but Draco’s emotions were bubbling over. More than anything, even his Dark Mark, Draco harbored shame over Potter’s unexpected bail out at his Wizengamot trial. His name, his fortune, and pride were gone, and with Potter’s acquitting speech, so was his last possession: his actions. Draco had been prepared to be held responsible. He had wanted to pay. Then, at least, he would have been made out to be human.  
“Touche Malfoy. Are you done here? Because I have no interest in reliving old sins.”  
Potter’s voice was bitter but sincere.  
“Shame. I was hoping you would gloat,” Draco replied.  
“About what, Malfoy?” Potters voice was raised now, desperate and defeated, “You think I enjoyed gutting my classmate in a bathroom? You think I ever thought myself capable of that? You think I enjoyed speaking at your trial, in a room full of faces that haunt my nightmares? I don’t know what you want, but you're not getting it from me today. Just leave me alone.”  
Dropping the shard he still held in his fist abruptly, Potter rushed towards the door, moving around Draco as he went. Oh how things had changed. As Potter swept by, Draco shot out a hand, snatching his left wrist to still him.  
“Wait. Shouldn't you heal it? You can’t just walk out like that.”  
“Watch me.”  
Potter never healed his cuts. Draco understood more than he wanted to.  
“Then at least take the rest of the day off. Get some sleep.”  
Draco didn’t think he could take watching Potter through the upcoming 2 hour period, having seen what he had. It would be too easy to read him as he fidgeted with his sleeves and stared at his desk, eyes blank with vertigo and misery.  
“And skip transfiguration? I’m not keen to. Year’s barely started.”  
“I’ll give you my notes. My handwriting is very neat.”  
Potter laughed, “You’ve got to be kidding me. And what do you think I should tell McGonagall when she finds out I skipped?”  
“You could tell her you tried to hex someone but it rebounded on you. They’d certainly not punish you for that. As far as the school is concerned, you can do no wrong.”  
Potter wrenched his arm from Draco’s grasp, “Cunt,” he snarled, and then was gone.

The 7th year Gryffindor boys dorm was empty. To Harry, it often felt empty even when it wasn’t. He was sitting in bed alone, covers unmade and half on the floor from last night when he had stumbled into his room past 4 and awoke to visions of clean, white train stations and petite elves bleeding onto sand. He didn’t know why he had taken Malfoy’s advice to skip class, but he knew he didn't have the capacity to hate the blond anymore. Malfoy was the only thing left in his world that was unpredictable. For how ill he appeared to be, he breathed more life into Harry than anything else. Harry rarely spoke to Ron and Hermione anymore. The two of them were closer than ever, healing through one another and feeding on familiarity, but they never got more than stilted small talk from Harry. That was likely why he had listened to Malfoy, he thought; he was starved of human interaction.  
Harry had thought his summer spent at the Burrow had been bad, but Hogwarts had proven to be worse. It had been nearly 5 months since Harry had felt the life fade from him and refuse to return. Voldemort's body had still lain crumpled in the Great Hall when the oppressive clouds that refused to break had drifted over. He had, and still did feel lost. He felt incomplete. He felt caged, faced with the awful realization that he had no idea who he was and that he was in no place to find out. Receding into himself with no way back out, he wanted to kick and scream and run, but couldn't be bothered to try.  
So he had followed Ron and Hermione back to the Burrow, apparating to Hogwarts during the day to relish in the manual toil of rebuilding the castle and laying passively awake in Ron’s room at night.  
The Weasley’s were no help, but Harry hadn't expected them to be. They had it worse than he did, so he put on a front, insisting that his willingness to return to Hogwarts and assist in repairs proved that he was okay, when really he was overwhelmed by guilt and exhaustion. Mrs. Weasley, however, was inconsolable. She cried constantly and silently. Ginny never left her side. Neither did Percy, in an attempt at repentance, but his presence only seemed to upset Molly further. Charlie had returned to Romania, and, half empty bottle of gin in hand, George had gone with him. Everyone had silently figured he would come back, but he never did, so Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes sat vacant in Diagon Alley.  
Harry had returned to Hogwarts along with Ron and Hermione. He hadn’t really wanted to, but granted, he hadn’t really wanted to do anything. Still didn’t. Classes were a welcome time suck, but his spells were sloppy and sleep poor. He found solace after curfews, working out alone on the grounds. It was the only thing that got him out of his head. It made his body hurt like the rest of him did, and that was an odd comfort. There, his sweat and tears and screams held no expectations. He was completely alone and freer from the binds that made him anxious. At night, the world was dark, and the lurid, gray ugliness that plagued him was therefore less noticeable.

After Harry left the bathroom, Draco stood in the doorway for a long minute, deep within the process of events. He wandered to the sinks, siphoning the blood away and mending the mirror with a quick Reparo. As the glass knitted itself back together, writhing unnaturally under the surface, Draco caught a glimpse of his reflection. He choked back the familiar visceral disgust, caught between staring and looking away. The guilt was never worse than when he was looking at himself. It felt like a confirmation that he took up space. That the terrible things he had witnessed and his heaviest failures were made palpable by his physical existence. He wanted to disappear. He wanted emptiness. Nausea welled up in his chest and he swallowed it down. He couldn’t remember when he last ate but his body thrummed with an acidic burning. It gratified him, reminding him that if he just stayed hungry, the illusion of control might start to stick.

Draco was surprised but pleased when Potter didn’t show for transfiguration. Across the lecture hall Granger and the Weasel Boy were whispering to each other with concerned expressions. Draco had hoped the absence of Potter would mean that he would finally be able to focus, but it turned out that not having him in class was nearly as distracting. His mind wandered, imagining Potter alone in his room or out in the halls. He looked out the window for good measure, thinking that Potter was probably stupid enough to be out for a fly. He smiled to himself as he mused, lips twitching imperceptibly.  
A deep worry, though, began to settle in Draco’s gut. He struggled to rid the sound of Potter’s shallow breathing or the green of his wild eyes from his head. He wondered if he should be keeping an extra eye on Potter. He would never tell. He probably wouldn't even try to help, but he desperately needed to know. He knew that he should stop sneaking out to spy on Potter at night, but by now the embarrassment of it had been stripped away and he was uncomfortably aware of the invasiveness of the act.  
“Mr. Malfoy, would you care to demonstrate?”  
The teacher’s words interrupted Draco’s thoughts.  
“Excuse me?” he stuttered.  
Professor Noverto gave him a patient smile. She was McGonagall’s replacement, the former teacher having resigned in order to fill the role of headmistress.  
“I asked if you would please demonstrate the state of matter transformation spell needed for advanced object conjuring. I trust you remember it from the homework last week?”  
Draco did remember, but it took an uncharacteristic few seconds for it to come back to him. He couldn't afford to be getting Es and As, and the sluggishness concerned him. It was vital that he be perfect if he wanted to avoid house arrest. His mind honed in on his fallibility and his fear, failing to notice when he again neglected to answer the question.


	2. Sharing a Drink They Call Loneliness

Harry had known Malfoy was watching him for a while now. A streak of white blond hair, radiating heat from a warming spell in the wind, or the occasional chatter of teeth gave him away. (Malfoy’s teeth seemed to chatter a lot actually. Even inside. It was a shock he hadn’t chipped one, really.) At first Harry had been furious; more furious than he can remember being since the war. His blood had boiled and he had snapped at Ron when offered a game of Wizard’s Chess. In his anger he had stubbornly refused to so much as look at Malfoy for a week. Slowly though, Harry felt less and less violated. He figured there wasn’t really anything left of him to violate. In all honesty, he was oddly okay with the idea of being watched in his most vulnerable moments. It was almost comforting to know someone else cared enough to notice. It had to mean something that the blond kept coming. Maybe he was plotting something. Maybe he understood. Harry was fine with either option.  
Tonight was a full moon. It shone clear in the night air, craters detailed on its surface as if they were close enough to touch and cold light reflecting off the frosty grass. The moon was making him bold. He watched it, noticing its movement across the sky as stars disappeared into its ring. Harry paused for a second before he spoke.  
“Malfoy, come out. I know you’re there. Come watch the moon with me.”  
All was still for what felt like 10 minutes but must have been maybe 2, but then Malfoy did come out, tentatively, from behind a hedge a hundred or so feet away. They watched the moon together in silence.

From then on Draco didn’t bother to hide. Some nights he joined Harry in the aimless exercise as he ran reps and sets after reps and sets. Most days he was too dizzy. Tonight, they were both content to lay still along the lake shore.  
“You never eat anything,” Potter said.  
“You cut yourself.”  
“You don’t sleep.”  
“You wreck your body in order to”  
“You always look like you're somewhere else.”  
“You always look like you’re nowhere.”  
The conversation petered off, but Draco felt more at ease then he had in months.

They didn’t acknowledge each other during the day, but they couldn't bring themselves to bicker either. There was no show to put on. So, nights were now the best part of Draco’s day. He looked forward to them in the afternoons and clung selfishly to memories in the morning. They were comfortable. Too comfortable. Guilt nagged at Draco. It didn’t feel right to depend. It felt worse to be depended on.  
He was watching the Weasley girl talk to an ambivalent Potter from across the Dinner Hall. He couldn’t remember seeing her this year, so she must have just arrived back at Hogwarts. Apparently, she was so out of the loop that she still thought Harry would bother to pay attention to conversations, because her face was flushing in frustration and her lip was quivering. Harry looked stony. Draco couldn’t see his eyes, but he imagined them to be sad.  
Draco pushed some food around on his plate, portioning some off to the side. He downed a glass of water and stood up to walk to the loo. As he stepped into the corridor, stars spun in front of his vision, blacking out his periphery until all he could see was a fuzzy and distorted oval directly in front of him. He ducked around the corner and hurried his pace towards the boy’s room as time slowed around him. Suddenly, the ground was awfully close and everything went dark.

Draco woke up on a stiff white cot in the Hospital Wing. A glass of pumpkin juice and a plate of beans and eggs sat on his bedside table, the cloying smell of the food making him a little queasy. He cast a tempus and read the time as just past 5 AM. In the adjacent room, he heard a faucet running. He was taking a tentative sip of the pumpkin juice when Madam Pompfrey bustled around the corner, lips puckered in an unpleasant grimace. Apparently, the sight of him reminded her of something sour.  
“Mr. Malfoy, awake I see,” she began in her sharp, no-nonsense tone, “I am sure you are wondering what you are doing here, and I assure you so am I. It seems you managed to faint during dinner last night. You scared a 2nd year half to death, laying in the middle of the floor like that, but there is no reason that you will not be able to return to class today. After all, your education is your top priority, yes? You may eat here or in the Great Hall, but I must insist you be more careful in the future. And I will reiterate the strict drug and alcohol policy on Hogwarts grounds. Take care, because the rest of us are managing just fine, so don't think you have the right to be making yourself a burden.”  
"After all you’ve done," Draco added spitefully to himself at the end of her impromptu speech. He practically threw himself off the bed in his haste to leave, the whole encounter leaving a bitter taste in his mouth, and made towards the dungeons to shower. He loosened his tie as he went, resentful that the nurse had allowed him to sleep in his formal uniform. He felt sticky and uncomfortable, buttons having dug itchy marks into his skin and belt bruising the base of his pelvis from lying on it for so long.

Malfoy hadn’t shown last night. Harry had waited for him until the sky lightened pale pink and the stars faded, and disappointment sat heavy in his stomach. Harry didn’t try to logic an explanation, he just let his emotions circle like vultures until he was consumed with rejection. He encouraged his anxiety, hurt spurring him on. After all, it was better than feeling nothing. It was better than the ungainly process of trying to make oneself feel better.  
He didn’t see Malfoy until potions, and he couldn't help but glare to where he worked steadily on his memory reviving drought with a 7th year Ravenclaw. He glared until his own potion was sludge brown and abandoned and he had worked himself into a self pitying pit of loneliness.  
He packed his things quickly after class, eying to be first to leave the room, and rushed out the door. He took random corridors and staircases, looking for an empty classroom to adopt for the next half hour, razor in pocket in a premeditated attempt to cut himself far earlier in the day then seemed reasonable (at this point, reason was out the window), when he heard footsteps behind him. He didn’t have to turn to know who it was.  
“You didn’t show last night,'' he said, stopping.  
“What am I to you?” Malfoy cut in abruptly, “Am I just a toy? A pet to treat as an imaginary friend? Does hanging around me make you feel better about yourself? Like even though you’re so stuck in your own pitiful world at least you can never be as lost as me, the boy who fucked up his life before it even happened. Do I remind you of the good old days? Can you sense Voldemort on me? Do you even know it’s me all these nights? Because it’s me. We hated each other for 7 years. I made fun of you for being an orphan. I called your best friend a mudblood and jinxed her teeth. I wrote a song about your other best friend being poor and having a fat mum and got the whole school to sing it. I took the bloody dark mark!”  
He yanked up his left sleeve for emphasis. Harry just looked at him, curious.  
“For fucks sake Potter. What happened to you! Where are your grudges? Your hot headed temper? Your stupidity? You're chaos, a loose canon. So hex me or something! What are you doing? Why can’t you just hate me like all your friends do, or look through me like everyone else? That would be better. Better than a game.”  
“Will you be there tonight?” was Harry’s only response.

Harry chose to run that night. He ran in wide circles, putting on random desperate spurts of energy as he did, his breathing an erratic manifestation of his anxious energy. Malfoy showed up early and watched the whole time, and as light began to break Harry stopped shakily in front of him.  
“I used to see into Voldemort’s head, you know. There was a part of his soul inside me. When I fell asleep I could see through his eyes. Sometimes even when I was awake. I think only you know what I’m talking about when I say he was pure hate. I had that inside of me for 16 years. I don’t think my body knows what to do now that it’s gone.”  
Malfoy seemed sincerely empathetic, seemingly prepared for Harry’s words. His brows knit and the creases on his forehead were distinct in the half light. His eyes were silver, as incisive and striking as his wit but hazy with something barely contained that Harry couldn’t place.  
“I never knew.”  
“Few do.”  
The conversation paused for a long moment.  
“I know who you are,” Harry said finally, “That's why I want you here. I think that’s why you want me here too. The fact that there’s baggage means there’s less baggage, I guess. We can just see each other as people. Neither of us feel alive inside so we’re on the same level.”  
Malfoy nodded, cold early light catching the sharp line of his narrow jaw. It was breathtaking. This boy, all alabaster skin and dark clothes, was projecting color into the world again. 

He was falling for Harry Potter and he could never tell anyone. The feelings he had were futile, the fluffy, childish, butterflies-in-stomach fairytale he never got to savor when he was a teen. A teen that thought muggles were animals and Dumbledore was foolish and that he liked girls. But Potter could never know. They had a good thing going, and Draco didn’t deserve to be the one who ruined it.  
Merlin, though, the man was beautiful. He had sharp cheekbones and straight teeth. His thick black hair grew cattywampus, flopping over a high forehead in random directions. His eyes were large and a piercing emerald, with translucent lids and long, dark eyelashes. Draco wanted to touch those eyelashes, wanted to feel them against his cheek.  
Potter held all his pent up tension in his neck, the tendons taut like a beast about to spring. Occasionally, his temple would twitch like he was trying not to bolt. When he and Draco were alone, Harry visibly relaxed. The differences were minute, but his shoulders lowered slightly and his eyes were less likely to glaze over into their lost and disgusted default expression. When he sat beside Draco, he would pull his knees to his chest, triceps flexing under his shirt and spine visible in a neat line of vertebrae and wiry muscle.  
His voice, too, was magnetic. He had an undignified central English accent and his grammar was lacking, but it was low and soft and musical. Draco really needed to stop thinking about it.  
Harry was telling him a story. It wasn’t a war story, the kind Harry was asked to retell daily by the type of people Draco would like to slap. Instead, it was a funny story. As he told the punch line, something about Weasley stealing his brother’s owl in order to prank-mail said brother’s girlfriend, his face lit up in a genuine grin, all wrinkled nose and gums and pudgy spot on the tip of his chin, and Draco couldn’t help but smile too.

Malfoy was an artist. He drew often but discreetly, almost unnoticeable to someone who wasn't always watching, and he carried his sketchbook with him everywhere. It was slim and elegant, bound in dragon hide but otherwise muggle in appearance.  
“Where did you get it? Your drawing pad?” Harry asked him once.  
“Harrods,” he had replied.  
“Isn’t it dragon skin?”  
“Oh. I stitched that on myself,” he shrugged.  
With graphite Malfoy drew harsh and quick, rapid lines pressed in hard enough to break the lead. With brushes, his strokes were long and languid, a purposeful caress of the page. Sometimes he used both mediums at once, directing with his wand like a symphony conductor.  
Harry decided on a rainy Thursday that he wanted to take Malfoy flying. He wondered if Draco had flown at all since the fiendfyre during the Battle of Hogwarts. He packed a snitch in his pocket and brought his broom towards the lake as midnight struck, hoping to play a seekers game but pondering whether he should suggest they share a broom at first. He really wouldn't mind that, but it might be too similar to bad memories.  
“What is that?” Malfoy said when Harry came into view.  
“I brought two brooms,” Harry replied, voice pitching up in order to answer a question with another question.  
“No,” Malfoy mumbled, “No, I can’t.”  
“It’s just us,” Harry assured, “Up to you how fast or high we go. Total control. And this way you’ll know. You’ll know whether it will be a trigger forever if you can fly again someday. I don’t want you to rob yourself of it. Did you know my first patronus memory was learning to fly? It's the freest joy in the world.”  
“You’ll start slow with me?” Apparently Malfoy was choosing to humour him. Or trust him.  
“Of course”  
Malfoy, as it turned out, picked it back up pretty quickly. They spun around each other, breathless from the icy wind in their lungs and the rush of racing, flipping, and chasing one another through the air. It was exhilarating, Malfoy a vision in slacks and a brilliant smile as he flew. The blond won the 3rd round, swooping low and letting out a whoop of victory as the snitch’s silver wings ticked his fingers and receded. Laughing, Harry lunged to snatch it from Malfoy’s palm, abandoning his broom and tumbling a foot or two onto the grass, one hand around Malfoy’s wrist and the other tugging on the back of the Slytherin’s broom to steady himself. Knocked off balance, Malfoy rolled upside down and landed beaming beside Harry.  
“I won!” he exclaimed, “I’ve never won!”  
“We’ll see if you can do it again,'' Harry challenged, pulling Malfoy onto the abandoned broom beside them before getting on behind and pushing off.  
They were sharing a broom, but the roles from the war were reversed. As he wrapped his arms around Malfoy’s narrow waist, he already couldn't remember what it was like to not know what it felt like. Harry could feel the worrying jaggedness of Malfoy’s bony frame, and his hands settled where his abdomen sunk in beneath his rib cage. The boy looked half dead, but his heart fluttered very much alive beneath Harry’s palms and heat radiated from his skin. They flew together for minutes, soaring low enough to see their surroundings in the dark but fast enough that they had to squeeze their legs tight to hold on. Neither of them spoke. Malfoy was nervously checking over his shoulder, and Harry took the time to think it endearing. Mostly, though, he just let himself be mesmerized.

Draco was somewhere between elated and terrified. He searched Harry’s face over his shoulder again and again, once having to wildly swerve away from the Whomping Willow due to his lack of attentiveness. As they finally began to descend, Draco glanced back once more, looking for contentment or discomfort on Harry, but as he turned and caught Harry’s eye and crooked smile, he was involuntarily leaning in, and his own chapped parted lips were met with ones that were pink and soft. Numb, Draco pulled back long enough to clumsily land the broom, cupping Potter’s cheek with his palm as they dropped to their sides, wind momentarily knocked from them.  
Potter smelled like oregano, bitten by the frost in the Malfoy Manor gardens, cracked leaves spicy and warm but burnt by the cold around the edges. He smelled of pastries pulled from the oven too soon, sweet and impatient. He smelled of phoenix fire, smokey and sincere and intuitive. He smelled of iron just beginning to rust. Where Draco was clever, all clean air and moss and the wise hardwood trees they made wands from, Harry was the whole forest; the sound of thestral wings and chlorophyll and the wild intelligence of centaurs. Draco closed his eyes, savoring as he kissed Potter again, glasses frames digging into his nose and Potter smiling despite himself against him.  
“I-,” Harry began, but Draco had frozen and pulled away, already shaking his head. I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry he thought, wishing Harry could hear into his head. He jumped to his feet, turned, and hurried off in a state of fight, flight, or flee. It wasn't that he hadn’t wanted to kiss Potter, it was that Potter had wanted to kiss him. And if Potter wanted to kiss him then the Gryffindor really didn’t know what was healthy, because Draco wasn’t good for beautiful things. He sucked up space, a black hole for familiarity and value and hope. He chanced a glance behind him and saw through the dawn light Potter’s devastation written on his face. Draco almost ran back to him.


	3. Abandon of the Reckless Type

Today Harry’s devastation was written on his sleeves. Quite literally. He had cried last night, and the blood and the sting of the knife on his skin had not been to feel or to punish, it had been to not feel. Had Harry not been so inconsolable, he would have figured that was a good sign. Even Ron and Hermione noticed his mood; he couldn’t even manage to small talk them today. He skipped class, went to Hogsmead, and came back with two bottles of firewhisky and a receipt. He wondered if Draco really didn’t want him or if he was playing hero, trying to save both their hearts. He wondered which one was worse. They didn’t play hero around each other. That was the deal.  
Malfoy didn’t seem to be faring much better. He was hunched and shaky and was a rare sighting at meals. Of course, Harry didn’t know that directly, he had just overheard Seamus and Ron comment on the blond’s absence.  
“Good riddance, I say,” Ron had said from beyond Harry’s closed bed curtains, “I didn’t need the filthy ferret darkening my day anyhow.”  
Seamus, ever a gossip, was eager to get his word in, “Rumour has it he won’t be back either. Michael Corner says Malfoy’s parole officer showed the other day. Apparently he’s failing charms so bad he's about to be sent back to house arrest.”  
“Never pegged him for being a pea brain,” Ron had laughed, “but I suppose all the hair gel had to melt his neurons eventually.”  
Harry felt sick. He had refused to attend meals since the fateful night now more than a week in the past. He was sure the Great Hall was buzzing and bustling as usual, 4 house tables alive as students moved between each other and talked amongst themselves, but Harry found the idea of it exhausting. He couldn’t stand that the rest of the world was moving on whilst his own life was shattering.  
He went out that night for the first time since flying with Malfoy. The night air was a painful reminder, and Harry thought it maybe wasn't great that a single person could ruin an entire time of day for him. He wandered the grounds, staying away from the lake side of the quidditch pitch and instead skirting Hagrid’s hut. Harry caught sight of flickering light inside the window, but he didn’t make his presence known and instead pulled his invisibility cloak back over his head. Hagrid had been quiet this year. Or maybe Harry had. He hadn’t had the energy to think about it, but the idea caused guilt to worm in his stomach anyway.  
When Harry reached the edge of the Forbidden Forest, he turned to walk alongside it, but as the trees started to wind their way closer to the castle, he began to move into the inky blackness of the woods. The tree canopy blotted out the moonlight and the undergrowth snagged at his laces, so Harry pulled his wand from the sheath on his thigh, thumbing the smoothness of the Holly branch fondly and casting a low, wide lumos.  
He stayed near the edge of the forest on what appeared to be an ill used path. He walked slowly and without intent, at one point stopping for nearly 10 minutes to watch a thestral and its foal sleeping peacefully beside a half-rotten stump before turning away with a lonely smile. His body was twitching with restlessness, but his head felt heavy on his shoulders. The familiar disconcerting feeling of being caged was flaring with vengeance and Harry let out an unsatisfying sob. Impulsively, he leapt to catch a mossy low-hanging branch of a nearby tree, yanking himself up to sit on it with a feral bout of strength.  
Climbing upwards in the tree with reckless abandon, wand held a little too tightly between his teeth, Harry was filled with unbearable anger. He wasn’t angry about anything in particular, but he had the insatiable urge to grab a fistful of his hair and pull. He was self-loathing, insecure, and unstable, reminding himself of one of his Aunt Marge’s bulldogs if it were to be met with a pack of pitbulls.  
Letting his emotions burn, he clung close to the trunk of the tree. He was high enough now that the branches were thinner than his wrists. His blood was pounding but his breathing was beginning to slow, the kindling fire in his head having been reduced to smoke and ash. Wrapping one leg around the trunk of the tree and supporting the other on a slightly less narrow branch, he sat awkwardly and stared towards the yellow light that filtered through the castle windows. He decided it was peaceful up high, like the air was easier to breath when it was far above the problems that plagued him.  
Harry hadn't anticipated how much harder it would be to get down, but he took it slow and steady, a polar opposite to how he had gone up, and landed back on solid ground faster than anticipated. Suddenly starving and bleary with exhaustion, we made his way back to the castle, disguised by his invisibility cloak. He considered visiting the kitchens for a bite to eat, but deemed himself in no mood to tickle a painting. Instead, as he had twice a day for the past week, he called for Kreacher, who, with an insolent crack, appeared at his bedside. The disgruntled elf, food already in hand, set a dish of cold spaghetti, half a treacle tart, and a vodka tonic on one of the Gryffindor Common Room’s ornate gold end-tables. Harry had always found those tables distastefully gaudy.  
“Thanks,” Harry muttered, but as Kreacher moved to dissaperate Harry motioned for him to stop.  
“Wait.”  
His voice was quiet, like it was speaking on his own accord. He was surprised he had spoken at all.  
“Don’t bother tomorrow. I’ll get food from the kitchens,” he finished, and took a sip of the drink, wrinkling his nose as he did so. It had the flat, nauseating taste of the type of alcohol that came in a plastic bottle.

Harry knew well that he had very little self-preservation. It was established that he didn’t really care. He forgave easily and fell hard, so if Malfoy was to leave Hogwarts, Harry would have to spend the little time he had left by his side, regardless of whether it flayed either of their hearts or not.  
It had been 9 days since they had last spoken, and today’s morning potions class began similar to those of the past week. Malfoy sat still, taking stiff notes from the front of the class and unresponsive when called on, and Harry showed up 15 minutes late, fidgeting in his chair so much that Hermione sent him a concerned frown and Ron kicked him under the table.  
The differences between then and the days before emerged after the homeworks were counted and textbooks turned to the proper page 324. From the front of the class, Draco got up slowly, making for the ingredients cabinet, and Harry hastily offered to collect the ingredients for himself and Ginny in order to follow him. It was her job on default, but she just shrugged.  
For a moment Harry was alone in the storage room with Malfoy. As the Slytherin caught sight of Harry’s form behind him, he moved coldly out of the way in the familiar dance of mutual avoidance.  
“Come eat lunch with me today?” Harry asked, “I can’t stand the Great Hall.”  
“You know I won’t eat,” Malfoy replied.  
“That’s okay,” said Harry.

Draco did eat. It was awkward at first, by both of their faults, as they sat on separate lake-facing benches near the Forbidden Forest. Draco couldn't imagine why Potter wanted anything to do with him, and Potter seemed lost inside his own insecurity. Guilt tugged at Draco’s resolve though, Potter’s obvious hurt and his comforting presence leaving Draco weak with relief. On unsteady legs, he pulled himself up and moved to sit beside Potter.  
It was like a mountain of bricks was removed from the air around them. A heavy breath escaped from Potter’s lungs, and his broad shoulders lowered and rolled back. As they unwrapped their food, the pregnant silence flowed to easy conversation and Draco ate 6 bites without even noticing.  
Seemingly on a whim, Potter transfigured his pumpkin juice to water (though Draco noticed it was still tinged a translucent orange), raising it into the air with a wave of his hand wandlessly and twisting it into a tornado of droplets, directing the movement with long fingers. Draco watched, fascinated. Potter closed his fist, and with a gentle chime the water fell back into the cup as a handful of ice chips. Harry picked one up, placing it between his incisors and crunching down.  
“That’s bad for your teeth,” Draco muttered.  
The brunette just grinned, “I get free insurance.”  
That night, Potter took Draco to a tree. The Gryffindor needed nearly half an hour of pacing and apparent searching, but finally he settled down near an old-growth copse towards the back of the castle. Pulling himself onto a particularly sappy and slimy branch, Potter gave Draco a crooked smile and held out his hand, as if for Draco to shake it.  
Draco hesitated for a moment, mind struggling to make sense of Potter’s intentions, but eventually decided that he really didn’t care. He wrapped a slender hand around Potter’s wrist, shivering as sparks raced down his spine when warm calloused fingers closed over his own, and let himself be pulled into the tree. The act of trust felt warm and fuzzy and like a much bigger thing than it was.  
Together they climbed higher and higher, pausing only when they could feel the tree swaying under their feet and palms.  
“This way it’s just us,” Potter said, “because we’re above all the baggage. The air is too thin for nightmares and bad coping mechanisms. So we’re real.”

Harry woke Saturday morning more rested than he had felt in more than a year. He had slept less than 5 hours, but today’s residual exhaustion didn’t have as much of a bite to it. Hermione woke him up half past 8, moving to shake Ron as well while he groped around on his bed-side table for his glasses.  
“We’re going out!” she said with far too much excitement for it being so early.  
“Can’t it wait?” Ron groaned, “Nothing’s open yet. Cause they're not fucking crazy.”  
Hermione gave the redhead a chaste kiss on the cheek, hurrying both boys towards the dresser.  
“No, we’re going hiking first, silly. Come on, up up sweethearts.”  
Harry really did not feel like going hiking. The first 30 seconds of his morning had been going so well, but something always had to come and fucking ruin it. Rolling out of bed with a sigh, he fished around in his dresser for a shirt and some jeans and slung his winter jacket over his arm.  
“What are we waiting for then? Lets go,” he said wearily.  
They stopped by the kitchen for a bite to eat and then walked the mile to Hogsmead. Hermione was beaming.  
“Really Harry,” she kept saying, “I’m so pleased you decided to come. I thought I’d have to drag you out, you’ve been so closed off lately. I really do love you, you know? This is going to be wonderful, just like old times.”  
“Yep, just like old times. Yippee,” Harry muttered under his breath. That's exactly what he was afraid of. He missed his friends more than anything, feeling their absence as a heavy hole in his heart, but being with them like this was bringing up memories he just couldn’t compartmentalize from the rest of his past. Thoughts of hunting for horcruxes and Grimmauld Place and all those he had lost crowded his brain until he was starting to have trouble breathing.  
To make it worse, Hermione had invited half a dozen other students, and Harry was flanked by Seamus, Dean, and Neville. Ginny and Luna had even managed to come along, although they weren’t in Harry’s class and weren’t technically allowed off Hogwarts grounds.  
Once in Hogsmead, Hermione side-alonged them in small groups to a coastal bluff that appeared to be somewhere in the Scottish Highlands. Birds sang in the distance and green stretched before them until it met the horizon and succumbed to the curvature of the Earth. The beginnings of sandy cliffs were rocky under their feet and salty air whipped under their hair. It was beautiful, but the apparition and the vast, tree-less hills were making Harry queasy. For all that he hated small spaces, he hated wide open ones even more, the extent of the sky above him and grass in front of him making him feel small and overwhelmed. It was a perfect storm. The whistle of the wind and violent crash of the waves combined with a chorus of too many voices forced Harry to draw into himself, blocking out the noise and the people with a wild, disturbed look in his eye.  
They may have walked for a long time or it could have only been a few minutes. Harry didn’t know or care. He just let the group carry him, thinking either of nothing or how atrociously ugly the dark, evil looking sea cliffs were.  
“...Harry? Harry!” Hermione was saying.  
“Hmm,” Harry responded, startled, turning a lazy half of his attention to her face.  
“I was asking if you agreed it was lovely here,” she repeated patiently.  
“Oh… yeah, definitely,” he said lamely, barely keeping a frown from his face as he attempted a reassuring smile.  
After that Harry was pretty much done. It really wasn't his day and things were only getting worse. He hated that his friends had made him do this. He hated that he hated them. He hated that they were able to think this place was so incredible. He hated having to lie.  
They ate lunch at a quaint café in a tiny town near the ocean, and then took some time to shop on the rather cheesy cobblestone mainstreet. The group split up thereafter and Harry, Ron, and Hermione apparated to the Three Broomsticks to grab drinks.  
Compared to the icy air outside, the bar was stiflingly hot and the smell of sweetened alcohol hung thick and humid in the air. Harry ordered two fingers of liquor and downed both in rapid succession, already desperate to get out of there even if it was only 4:30. He stuck it out though, figuring another torturous hour was nothing compared to the entire torturous day.  
They arrived back on Hogwarts grounds around dinner time, and Harry made his excuses, desperate to get out of anything else that expected him to be social. He was sick of faking it. Harmione gave him a brief hug, her mannerisms controlled and worried as if she thought he might snap at her touch, and Ron gave him a half hearted pat on the back. He took the long way alon the grounds to the Boat House, staring out at the lake feeling at once gut-wrenchingly lonely and satisfied in his long awaited solitude. Standing at the end of the dock he peeled off his coat and set it behind him, letting the breeze chill him to the bone until his teeth chattered and his lips paled. On an impulse, he took a deep breath and jumped into the lake.  
The cold of the water knocked the wind out of him, and Harry choked as icy blackness closed over his head. Weighed down by shoes and clothing, he swam for the surface to catch his breath, treading water for a few moments until the dizzy rush turned to unbearable, excruciating numbness.  
When the edges of his vision began to go fuzzy and he grew apathetic towards staying afloat, warmth settling in his body and a peaceful weight on his limbs, he finally got out. He pulled himself chest-first onto the wooden dock, wedging a few splinters into his skin as he did so. He flipped onto his back, staring at the sky and getting up only when the water in his hair started to turn to ice.

Dinner had just ended and Draco was pacing the path along the lake, lost in thought, when he noticed the form of Harry Potter moving towards him in the darkness. Illuminated by the yellow lamps along the trail, Draco could see that Potter was soaking wet. His hair was sticking up in messy tufts and his shirt clung to his form, revealing the outline of his biceps and chest. He was shivering violently.  
“What the fuck did you do!” Draco exclaimed, startling Potter from his reprieve.  
“Jumped in the lake,” he replied sheepishly.  
“Excuse me?”  
Draco’s eyes were wide and scared.  
“Jumped in the lake,” he repeated.  
“What the fuck! You insolent prat, it's minus 10 degrees out here! Did you stop to think what would happen if you had gone and died!” Draco chastised, fear lacing his voice. He fiercely wanted to touch Potter’s skin, just to make sure it was still warm.  
“I didn’t die though.”  
“Why did you do it? What happened?”  
Draco was slowly calming down. Potter needed comfort and so he was doing his best to give it. For this man, he’d do about anything.  
“Just a really shitty day. Look, I’m not really in the mood to talk, but if you want to just sit that would be nice.”  
Draco smiled despite himself.  
“Okay. Just change out of the wet stuff first.”  
He pulled off his coat and jumper, leaving him in a loose T-shirt, and handed the jumper to Potter.  
“Thanks,” He responded, stripping off his own shirt from where it was starting to solidify to his body with ice.  
Draco’s eyes followed the movement involuntarily. Harry’s collar bones were broad and structured and his pectorals defined. He had a thick oval scar below his neck and another more jagged one by his solar plexus, not to mention the layered ones on his forearms. His abs were perfect, firm and flat all the way down to his belly button, where fine dark hair grew to meet his waistband. His hip bones were narrow and angled suggestively down, and the muscles in his stomach quivered and spasmed from the cold.  
“Merlin, you’re breathtaking,” Draco whispered.  
Potter laughed nervously, pulling Draco’s jumper over his head.  
“Now I get it. You were just trying to get me out of my clothes,” He joked between teeth chatters.  
Potter spelled the rest of his clothes dry, but said Draco’s shirt was still much better. The charm couldn’t shake the cold, apparently, and nothing beat body heat.  
“Whatever you say, Potter.” he said in reply.  
“Harry,” Potter responded after a moment's pause, “Call me Harry.”  
“Okay,” he agreed.  
For the rest of the night before they both turned in for a hot shower, Harry called Draco Draco and Draco called Harry Harry. It kind of felt like a big step.

“You want me yeah? Like that?” Draco said a fortnight later.  
“More than anything,” replied Harry. They were sitting against the stands of the quidditch pitch, legs an inch from touching and moon high in an unseasonably clear sky.  
“Why?” Draco asked. His tone wasn’t loaded, just curious.  
“You’re smart. You're sarcastic. You have great bone structure and long legs. I find you bloody gorgeous. You try to think before you speak. You’re graceful and tactful and good at everything you try.”  
“But that doesn’t make me special,” Draco pushed, “What does? Why me?”  
“I guess you get me,” Harry continued, “We both had our whole lives planned for us. We were taught we weren’t good enough and raised with a purpose we had no choice but to accept. We had our identities stripped and were abandoned to drift. We hate our very instinct, our anger and defensiveness. We loathe to be defined by our names but wear our guilt on our sleeves.”  
“And?” Draco asked.  
“You cut through the noise, Draco,” Harry sighed, “I haven’t gotten you out of my head for 8 fucking years. You ground me, not as a contrivance I made up but as you. I think it's always been you.”  
“When did you learn to express yourself Potter?” Draco muttered, “I thought I’d need a DaVincii code to decipher this conversation. But there you go being so irritatingly sure of yourself.”  
Harry giggled.  
“See?” he said, shifting closer.  
“Kiss me?” Draco whispered.  
“Gladly.”  
Harry shifted to lean over Draco, brushing blond strands off his forehead with one gentle hand and placing the other high on Draco’s thigh. The kiss was brief, just a sweet brush of dry, soft lips, but it felt like flying. He melted, eyes still closed as Harry pulled away.  
“Yeah?” the Griffindor said, awe seeping into his voice.  
“Yeah,” Draco replied, the magic of the moment conveyed between the simple words.


	4. Some Fortune Cookies are Shaped Like Wings

Draco was exhausted. And stressed and panicked and holy shit, he thought, swallowing a non-sequitur exclamation of some choice expletives. He was smack dab in the middle of November midterms, and his continuation at Hogwarts quite literally depended on his performance. His potions exam was about to begin, and although Harry had coaxed him to eat for 3 lunches in a row now, he hadn't been able to keep anything down today. Nerves bunched in his stomach as he stiffly started towards the ingredients cabinet and he choked down bile as he precisely collected his moonstone dust, kappa skin, and abraxon hairs.  
As he turned to leave, basket full, he met Harry, who gave him an encouraging smile and slipped a crumpled note into Draco’s free hand.  
“I should probably try to sleep tonight,” Draco whispered as they brushed past each other.  
“You know you won't be able to anyway. Just come?” Harry replied.  
“Fine,” he said, attention already returned to his imminent exams.

The note had read "Surprise tonight. 11:30. Meadow near the climbing tree." Draco smiled, pulling it from his pocket for the upteenth time, and gathering his coat to leave. It was three quarters to midnight and Draco felt lighter already. He had 2 final tests tomorrow, but he was feeling confident and relatively sharp. When he arrived in the clearing, wand lit in a high arc, he found the grass rimmed with twinkling candles. Harry was knelt towards the far end of the meadow, tinkering with something on the ground that Draco couldn’t see.  
“Hi,” he said with a grin, noticing Draco, “I’m glad you came.”  
“Aren’t you chipper,” Draco said, forcing sarcasm. Harry’s excitement was infectious.  
“What’s got you in the mood.”  
“Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes,” Harry grinned.  
“Excuse me?”  
“The shop’s still dormant, with George gone, but Lee hooked me up with some fireworks. Said George would want me to have them. I figured you’d need a pick-me-up. Anyway, I do hope you like it,” he rambled.  
Draco was having trouble keeping up.  
“What?” he asked again.  
“Just lay down with me,” Harry said, pulling Draco by the hand to lay on his back at the center of the clearing. Once settled, their hands remained joined, sending tingles up Draco’s arm and spine.  
Harry made a gesture towards the package at the far end of their feet and Draco watched amazed as the fireworks leapt to life. They danced in the night sky, taking the shape of phoenixes and dragons and bursting with shows of color. It was dynamic and brilliant and mesmerizing.  
After a minute Harry conjured a spark in his palm, sending it spinning into the air to chase the light show with delighted amusement. Draco’s eyes were glued to Harry’s flame. It was warm and fiery, but seemed to take on Harry’s emotions as he reacted to the fireworks. Draco could feel Harry’s magic washing over him, sending his nerves alight and causing a pleasant dizziness in his head. Harry was radiating, his joy flowing through the tips of his fingers, power shimmering in an aura around him that was almost a visible golden.  
“Are you doing that wandless?” Draco asked, voice cracking.  
“Yeah,” Harry said.  
Draco unsuccessfully stifled a groan, and Harry turned to face him, hand still clutching Draco’s.  
“Come here,” He whispered just below the pale shell of an ear.  
And then they were lip-locked, and Draco had never felt anything better. The raw reverence and muse that thrummed through Harry’s magic wrapped around him, fluttering beneath his skin and into his veins. It was bliss. It was hope. It was entirely overwhelming and Draco never wanted it to end. Harry’s tongue swiped his lip, unrestrained and needy and he parted his lips without hesitation, shivering when Harry licked behind his teeth and over the roof of his mouth. At this point, Harry was completely on top of him, hands pulling at his hair and tightening on the back of his thigh, black locks ticking his nose as Harry ducked lower to suck a series of bites down the column or his neck. Over and over in his head, until it was all that tied him to reality, Draco thought amazing amazing amazing amazing.

Draco had Harry pressed to the wall of the Third Floor Corridor, one hand reaching under his shirt and the other on the nape of his neck, elegant fingers messaging the knots and sore spots Harry always carried there. They were losing track of time, which was not ideal, considering they had less than 15 minutes between classes. Harry’s eyes were closed, a comforting warmth settling over him as they kissed slow and hard, every angle change or sweep of tongue utter luxury, and he almost missed it when Draco pulled back and spoke quietly into his mouth.  
“Harry.”  
“Mmm. What? Whydya stop?” Harry sighed in a voice that was far whinier than intended.  
“Do you hear footsteps?”  
“You're still coherent enough to be paying attention? I must be doing a terrible job,” he said distractedly, tugging at Draco’s waist.  
“Do you not want me to be? Come on, in here,” Draco hissed, pulling them both into a supply closet.  
“Uh…” Harry had barely gotten out by the time everything went pitch black around him.  
Beside him Draco giggled.  
“It’s kind of scandalous isn’t it! Hiding in a closet at a boarding school? Never thought that would be me. It’s like the gay dream.”  
His laughter, though, was met with silence, and after a moment he added, much more seriously, “Harry, you okay?”  
“Can you just keep kissing me?” Harry replied shakily.  
Draco’s features softened in concern behind the shroud of the darkness.  
“You want to talk about it?”  
Harry’s reply was unceremonious.  
“I used to live in a closet.”  
Draco waited for him to continue.  
“The muggles I lived with, they didn’t really want me. So I lived under the stairs. They used to lock me in. For silly things, you know, messing up dinner or accidental magic. Anyways, it made me a little claustrophobic.  
Draco leaned in for another kiss. Harry noticed it was saltier than Cho Chang’s.

“Have you ever cast a patronus?” Harry asked abruptly. They were sitting along the shore of the lake after a long run through the grounds.  
“No. Never tried,” Draco said from beside him.  
“I haven’t either. Since before the war, I mean. It’s all willpower and optimism that I just didn’t have after Sirius. And then when I died, you know,”  
“Died,” Draco cut him off, horrified,  
“Another day,” Harry said, “Anyway, after I died I thought I couldn’t do it anymore. Like my magic was tainted. But I think I want to try again.”  
He stood, pulling Draco to his feet with him.  
“Come try with me?” He pleaded.  
Harry closed his eyes, collecting his thoughts and focusing entirely on Draco. Sitting atop the tree with Draco, kissing Draco, his smile, his expressive gray eyes, all of it. Taking a shaky breath and mustering his confidence, he cast.  
“Expecto Patronum,” he shouted, and the silvery stag burst from the tip of his wand. It’s fur was slick and shiny, laying flat against it’s powerful flanks. It paced, watching them with wild and mercurial eyes that promised a patience and wisdom Harry didn’t remember seeing in them before. It’s antlers were impressive, several feet tall with half a dozen prongs each.  
“Wow,” Draco breathed.  
Harry laughed in relief, a tear dripping down his face from his nose to his chin.  
“It’s the same,” he grinned, voice growing louder with a whoop of joy, “I thought all this would have changed me. But I'm still there. I’m still my dad.”  
“Teach me?” Draco asked.  
“Of course,” Harry said, eyes still on the stag.  
“Okay,” he instructed, hand laid gently over Draco’s on the blond’s hawthorn wand. The wood felt familiar and welcoming under Harry’s fingers.  
“You just need to hold the wand steady. There’s no flick or movement. You just want the wand to be as centered and steady as you are. Focus on a memory. It has to be the happiest, most pure thing you have ever experienced. You have to feel what you felt in that moment, but you have to treat it like a memory too. You have to know that this moment, whatever it is, is entirely you.” He stepped back, observing as Draco took a deep breath.  
“Expecto Patronum,” he tried nervously. Nothing happened. Harry waited for him to take a moment, giving Draco a patient nod.  
“I taught half of our class to do this, and no one ever got it on the first lesson. It takes practice and confidence.”  
“Expecto Patronum,” he said again with far more gusto. I white filmy mist jetted from his wand, bathing him in haze but forming no animal.  
“That's it!” Harry praised, interrupting him with a hug. Draco smiled, flinging both arms over the boy’s shoulders and losing them both in a series of increasingly deep kisses.  
Harry was packing up for the night, removing his warming spells and pulling out his invisibility cloak when Draco tried a last time. It caught him by surprise, having only turned his back a moment ago.  
“Expecto Patronum,” Draco shouted, voice sounding steadier than Harry had ever heard it and distinguished accent slipping into the vowels. Light leapt from the tip of his wand, and Harry watched in stunned silence. The air whooshed around the form as it took off with striking grace and speed. It was only when it soared, 20 feet above their heads, that Harry figured out what it was.  
The heron’s wingspan was massive, long feathers glowing a soft blue grey under the silvery sheen and elegant neck stretched in front of it. It was a perfect fit, graceful and powerful and patient, yet nervous and intelligent. Together, they stared for a long, long time.

When Harry returned to the Gryffindor Common Room for his afternoon free period he found Hermione sat on the loveseat by the fireplace, head tucked into her hands. He sat quietly beside her.  
“You okay?”  
“Yeah,” she answered miserably.  
“Penny for your thoughts then?” Harry inquired, putting a comforting arm around her shoulder.  
“I just don’t know what we're going to do, you know, once we graduate. A part of me feels like our lives are over already. I’ve seen so much I can’t not try to fix it all, you know, but I wonder how much I have left in me. What do you think, Harry? What will you do.”  
He rubbed her back soothingly, thinking she was daft to believe her purpose was served. He could picture her clearly, holding a gavel atop the Wizengamot jury or swearing in as Minister of Magic. But Hermione seemed to be in need of information rather than advice, so he thought about her question.  
He had often struggled with this same dilemma. He had no idea who he was, and no exit plan to escape the hole Voldemort had imposed upon him.  
“I’m done with violence,” he began eventually, “I want out of the ministry and the press and the bullshit. Everyone thinks I’ll become an auror but the thought makes me sick. I think I’m only sure of two things, and that’s that I don’t want violence and that I want to be home.”  
“You could teach,” Hermione said. She always said talking through someone else's problems helped her fix her own, so Harry humoured her.  
“What do you mean?” he asked.  
“At Hogwarts, of course,” she said, “They still need a permanent defence teacher.”  
“You think I could?” Harry was skeptical, “Wouldn’t it be weird? I’ve spent my whole life here. I’m not mature. I’m not worldly. What would I have to give?”  
“Oh Harry,” Hermione laughed, “You’ve seen more of the world than almost anyone,” She paused, thinking, “ But if you wanted to experience something new you could go to University first I suppose.”  
“University? How. I don’t have a transcript.”  
“Hogwarts sets students up with fake ones all the time. You could get a muggle teaching degree. Figure out what the world is like when it’s not trying to kill you, muggle and wizarding alike.”  
“Thanks Hermione. That’s brilliant help,” Harry said. He liked her ideas much better than his own.  
“You're very welcome,” Hermione responded, “Let’s do it again sometime. I’ve missed you.”

“What are you going to do? After Hogwarts I mean,” Harry asked Draco that night. The blond shrugged.  
“I wanted to get a potions mastery but Slugghorn wouldn't give me the light of day. As far as he’s concerned I’m the modern scourge on Slytherin House.”  
“You could try St. Mungo’s? Neville says they’re always looking for lab apprentices,’ Harry said, “Your professors would push for you. I would push for you. And it wouldn’t be just one person teaching. It would take time, but if you integrate yourself into the community people will forget.”  
“You really think so,” Draco wondered aloud.  
“Yeah, I really do.”  
“How about you. Are you going back to the Weasley hovel?”  
Harry shuddered.  
“No. No way.”  
“The Black property then?”  
“No. That’s worse.”  
“You’re not leaving the country, are you?” Draco’s voice shook a little bit as he asked.  
“Definitely not. I’m staying here.”  
“Good.”

Harry was up early, slipping out of the dorm room long before the December sun broke the horizon and closing the door quietly behind him so as to not wake the other 7th and 8th year boys. He crept down to the fourth floor under his invisibility cloak, towel and change of clothes in hand, and passed the portrait of Boris the Bewildered on his way to the prefect’s bathroom. He had manipulated the password out of a 6th year, and although he felt sticky and gross over doing it, he figured a long bath would wash the feeling away. He hated schmoozing more than anything, but if the war had stripped him of his pride, it was sure to have stripped him of his humility as well. Whispering the password under his breath, he pushed the door open and stopped dead in his tracks.  
Draco was stood in front of the largest bath, wand held outstretched. His eyes darted suspiciously from the open door to the ground where Harry’s feet were currently concealed.  
“Show yourself,” he said nervously.  
Harry pulled the invisibility cloak over his head slowly but said nothing. Grey eyes took him in with surprise, lips moving to say something but stopping as he followed Harry’s line of sight.  
Draco’s chest was bare, revealing 2 long scars. They were slightly purple against his pale skin, smooth and ropey from where they stretched diagonal across his belly button and solar plexus. Harry’s knees felt weak and his chest hollow, like the breath had been knocked out of him. He had known Draco would likely have scars, but his reaction was more visceral than anything he could have imagined. A tear streaked down his face but his thoughts were blank. His peripheral vision faded to a dirty gray and he took a tentative step back, pressing himself against the door.  
“Harry. Harry, it’s okay,” Draco coaxed, but the Gryffindor barely heard. His emotions were spiraling, guilt threatening to swamp him and sorrow digging in like nails.  
“I’m here, right. I didn’t die. It’s over,” He tried again, “I don’t even mind the scars. They really helped me out, you know. Having them there legitimized what I had lost. They stopped me from gaslighting myself. Otherwise, I would have gone crazy thinking I was crazy.” Draco gave a weak laugh at the end, trying his best but clearly having no idea what to say. He took a few paces towards Harry, who glued his feet to the ground, willing himself not to bolt.  
“God I’m so sorry,” he mumbled, “The whole world was on your back and I tried to kill you. I gave you a permanent reminder that someone wanted you to suffer. All this time I’ve lived with myself for it and I still don’t know how. I want to care about you. I do care about you. More than anything. But how can I? After I did that much damage?”  
“Harry, I don’t care! It’s over. Please stay. We can talk it out.” Draco sounded desperate.  
“I had no idea what that spell did. I was impulsive and arrogant and scared and you looked so broken. I had no right. Where would we be? If I had just offered to help? If I had put myself aside for just one fucking second and led with my head.”  
“I wouldn’t have taken the offer. And for what it’s worth, I’m glad we waited until now. I wouldn't trade the last 3 months for anything. We’re here, Harry. Here and now and that’s enough for me. So come back to the present, yeah?”  
Harry took a deep breath, Draco’s name on his lips as he exhaled.  
The blond reached for his hand, close enough to touch it but waiting for Harry to move first.  
“Come swim with me,” he said, and Harry nodded, holding his arms up so gentle fingers could remove his jumper and letting himself be pulled into the warm, soothing bubbles.


	5. Seasonal Depressives and Their Favourite Christmas Carols

Pre-Christmas exams were due to be finished that afternoon and all that was left to do was pack. Harry was to return to the Burrow along with Ron, Hermione, and Ginny, and he was dreading it. He wondered if he even knew his friends at all anymore. They talked, certainly, but it was brief and inconsequential. Even Ron had figured out long ago that Harry was hiding something, but they had all seemingly just accepted it and moved on. Ginny became frustrated with him easily, and Harry caught Hermione staring at him with a sad look in her eyes, but each of them had all but said, “I love you, Harry, but I’ve got too much to deal with on my own to add you to it.”  
Harry’s final class of the year went by quickly. He marked his written test with near illegible chicken scratch, thinking that he was likely performing better than he had in any year prior but still managing to splatter ink over the one answer he was 100% sure about.  
Professor Noverto was pulling students one by one into her office for applied testing, and when Malfoy walked to Harry’s desk to let him know his turn was up (P came right after M and neither of the Patil twins were in this class), she was beaming behind him. Apparently, Draco had performed brilliantly. Harry’s heart thrummed with pride, and he glanced over his shoulder to where the Slytherin was settling back into his seat, catching his eye with a smile.  
After successfully conjuring wine from water and a champagne flute from nothing, as well as unsuccessfully turning snowball into a snowglobe, Harry was sent back to his paper. Plopping down in his chair, he attempted to refocus his energy, but he couldn't keep his eyes away from Draco. The blond was leaned over his desk, writing furiously with shoulder muscles twitching under his thick robes. It was captivating. Occasionally, Draco would chance a glance back at Harry. Draco usually wasn’t that bold, for fear of someone else catching suspicions, Harry found the lack of inhibition particularly alluring.  
Both Harry and Draco were eager to meet that night, as it was their last for nearly 2 weeks.  
“You nervous to go back to the ministry safehouse,” Harry asked, after casting a warming spell and laying down a charmed picnic blanket.  
“Bloody terrified,” Draco responded.

And then they were kissing, Harry falling roughly backwards onto the blanket, that, although being quite thin, felt as soft and luxurious as a mattress.  
“God I haven't been able to think about anything else all day. Couldn’t keep my eyes off you,” Malfoy said into Harry’s mouth, waiting for Harry’s lips to part and then diving in, hot and filthy. Draco’s hands were everywhere, and Harry was just trying to keep up. He wound his hands into loose soft hair and closed his eyes while Draco’s nails scratched the skin along his hip, tracing to his navel, across his abs and around his nipples, pushing Harry’s shirt up as he went. Lifting himself up slightly and shedding the shirt, Harry again lay back, cocking his neck as Draco bit and licked the sweet spot behind his ear.  
“Merlin, Draco,” Harry breathed as blood rushed hot and dizzying through the base of his head. He felt short of breath. He felt high out of his mind. The sensations catching up to him as Draco sucked a series of violently purple hickies around his chest, Harry gently pushed the blond back a foot. Reaching to the hem of Draco’s shirt, he paused for consent. Draco just lifted his arms up in impatience.  
“Pants too?” he asked.  
“Pants too,” Draco said, “but let me do that.”  
Draco had both their belts undone in two deft motions and was already onto buttons. With Draco’s hands on the zipper of his trousers, Harry was far past dignity and shimmied out of his clothes rather ungracefully.  
Draco was far too eager. Harry wanted to just look. This was entirely new and entirely better than any amount of rutting or kissing or palming they had done before. Draco’s chest was pale and milky and his stomach was defined with shallow but stark muscle definition. Harry’s eyes settled on the scars, pink and sinewy where they crossed from his armpit to his navel. Draco gave Harry a soft smile and a shake of his head. They had had this conversation, so Harry redirected his eyes lower.  
Harry’s breath caught. Draco was long and flushed and slightly curved at the tip. He reached to touch and Draco groaned. Apparently, he had had enough of just looking. Draping himself back over Harry, he kissed him hard, lips never losing contact for minutes on end. They rolled over and over on the grass, sweaty and giggling and senseless. At some point Malfoy must have conjured lube, because when their hips rolled together and things shifted between their stomachs, it was slick and blissful.  
Harry was on his back again, Draco’s hand running up and down his flank before dropping to his inner thigh. He thumbed along the veins on the underside of Harry’s dick, palming his balls as a long index finger ran along his perineum. Harry was whining and babbling and gasping along with it. At least he thought he was. He really couldn't be sure.  
As Draco continued to rub, gentle but sure, things suddenly became much much smoother. A wet finger ghosted around his rim, tickling pleasantly, and Harry was suddenly nervous.  
“You okay?” Draco asked, but he was cut off by Harry’s fierce lips on his again. That was answer enough. One finger slid in, and Harry squirmed as it worked him in circular motions, increasing in pressure until Draco finally (finally) found his prostate. Harry shuddered from the tips of his fingers to his toes. He moaned loud enough to warrant the Muffliato they had cast beforehand. One finger became two and Harry was begging, pleading, like he never thought he would. Wrenching his lips away, Draco was shifting down Harry’s body, mouthing over his defined abs and tickling the hair that grew between his hip bones.  
And then Draco’s mouth was on him and nothing had ever been better. It was tentative at first, all kitten licks and experimental sucks on the head, but then Draco’s tongue was running up and down the underside, running through the slit, and oh god, he was sinking down around Harry, Draco’s throat tight and hot and rhythmic as he swallowed. Butterflies were building at the base of Harry’s stomach, veins carrying the feeling all the way through him. His blood sang and his mouth was open, the spots behind his eyes filling with warmth. He tried to warn Draco as his sensitivity peaked, stinging sensation turning to ecstasy that flooded his system.  
Below him, Draco swallowed, then coughed, fingers slowing inside as he moved back up to straddle him. Harry opened his eyes to meet gray ones, pupils blown wide but reflecting silver in the low light. He flipped them and returned the favor, relishing the weight and salty taste on his tongue before it was over in seconds.

Mrs. Weasley had seemingly regressed. Ginny swore, tears streaming down her cheeks, that Molly had been okay when she had returned to Hogwarts, but now they were forced to watch as the once confident and motherly woman paced the kitchen. When her daughter sidled up beside her to finish chopping an abandoned shallot, she barely noticed, never ceasing to mutter under her breath and dart her eyes.  
Dinner was served early like usual, but it tasted melancholy, and when Harry chanced stepping out of his room for the loo past 2 in the morning, he caught Molly, Ginny, and Ron on the couch, clutching one another with tears rolling onto their clothes.  
The rest of the holidays went by painfully slowly. George had come home with Charlie, but by the next morning he was gone again. Percy and Arthur were working late hours, looking in as much disrepair as the ministry itself, and Hermione was for much of the time unreachable, staring either into space or at a battered photograph that Harry assumed was of her parents.  
At one point Ginny had tried to kiss him. They had been sitting quietly in Ron’s room, and Harry had just assumed she had shown for a moment of quiet. Instead she leaned in, a soft hand on his jaw and lips approaching his, and Harry had roughly pushed her off, wiping his mouth.  
“I thought you were ready,” she had whispered, tears in her warm brown eyes, “You seemed better recently and-”  
“You and me, it was great, but it was then. We’re not kids anymore, Gin, you gotta let it go,” he had interrupted.  
On Christmas morning, Harry’s customary jumper unraveled in multiple places where Molly had skipped stitches. The rest of the gifts were generic and impersonal and few words were shared. Once the wrapping paper was vanished and brunch eaten, everyone seemed eager to return to their rooms upstairs. Even Ron, who had awaited this trip with guilty desperation, told Harry that he was counting down the days until they returned to Hogwarts.

Draco spent most of his Christmas in the white walled, windowless bedroom of the ministry safehouse he had spent his summer. Aurors paced the perimeter at all times and the place was a complete dead zone, not even house elf magic working from inside it. Neither Draco nor his mother were allowed out of the house, as stated in the lines of their fragile parole, and Draco had to continuously remind himself that it was better than Azkaban.  
He talked with his mother regularly, the idea of her spending the past 4 months alone tugging at his heart, but he skirted any conversation topics regarding his own well being. Narcissa’s lean and elegant form seemed frailer than Draco had remembered and her hair hung limp like the drab coldness of the house had absorbed into it. 

At the first supper in the Great Hall upon returning to Hogwarts, Harry made a show of leaving early. Exclaiming that he had eaten enough over the past two weeks to last a month, thank you very much, he waited until Draco’s eyes met his from across the tables and then made for the foyer.  
Draco found him 10 minutes later leaning against a hedge by the lake. He hugged the blond close, noting that he seemed skinnier than when they had last met (that was okay. Harry’s arms were still stinging from the layers of fresh scars), and breathed deeply into his hair, savoring the familiar closeness. Draco leaned down an inch to kiss him, and Harry hummed, the taste heaven on his tongue and feel of cool hands on his jaw so, so welcome.  
“I love you,” Draco whispered against him, and neither of them had said it before but it sounded more natural in the air than the wind or the lap of the lake shore.  
“I love you too,” he responded without hesitation.


	6. To Make Lemonade, Mix Carelessness and Kisses

Harry pulled Draco aside after Herbology on the first day of January that it didn’t snow and it didn’t rain. They hadn’t had class together, but Harry was waiting for him behind the greenhouse, grabbing his arm and pulling him under the invisibility cloak when he passed. Draco leaned into Potter, sighing as strong arms wrapped around his body and squeezed him in flush.  
“I made us a picnic,” a soft voice said into his ear, words ticking at his hair.  
“We already skipped lunch twice this week,” Draco said.  
“And who cares,” he urged, “Come on. It's Friday. And we don’t have class until 3.”  
“Fine. Where too?”  
“Far side of the lake.” Draco could feel Harry smile against his skin.  
“Lead on.”  
They walked along the shore at a leisurely pace until they passed the boathouse and neared the site of Dumbledore’s grave. Finding a nice grassy area, Harry summoned a basket from the bottom of his extendable bag and laid a sheet down on the grass. Letting his school books drop to the ground, he twisted to face Harry, backing himself up against the broad trunk of a tree and encouraging him to follow. He gathered his weight, letting his arms wrap securely over Harry’s shoulders and jumping up to wrap his legs around the brunette’s waist, locking his ankles tightly at the back. It was a cold day but their heavy winter cloaks were quickly becoming too hot. Draco fussed impatiently with the high collars around Harry’s neck, eager to taste the warm skin of a collarbone. The tendons of his neck stood out with the strain of holding Draco up, and the Slytherin could feel the rapid beat of a heart beneath his lips.  
Harry nudged Draco to meet his mouth halfway, the angle awkward but kiss searing and messy as soon as it began. Harry dropped Draco back down to gain leverage, and the blond let out an embarrassing squeak as his knees nearly buckled. He worked to undo the top buttons of Harry’s thick black school ropes, tugging at a red and gold tie to pull it loose.  
“I thought we were having a picnic,” he said as Harry licked at the shell of his ear.  
“Later,” Harry mumbled, nipping at sensitive bits of milky skin. He used one hand to clumsily undo the buttons of Draco’s clothes and searched blindly for his wand with the other, eventually giving up and casting a warming charm and simple disillusionment spell wandlessly with an exhilarating rush of power. It sent sparks up Draco’s limbs wherever they touched, imprecise but expressive.  
“I can-- oh, fuck-- feel your magic,” Draco panted. Harry just smiled, joining their lips together with a series of explorative kisses while all four of their hands worked to loosen clothes.  
By the time shirts were off and belts beginning to be undone, Draco was self consciously aware of the fact that his entire body, from his legs to his cheeks, were a blotchy pink. His chest and neck were scattered with teeth marks and bruises and his hair clung to his neck. He pulled Harry back up from where he knelt by a sharp hipbone, working the man’s undershirt over his head. Harry stood back up, an arm's length away, and Merlin was he gorgeous.  
His hair was dark, thick, and unruly, falling over his high forehead to tickle defined eyebrows. His eyes were deep set, swirling with intricate patterns of emerald and olive. His nose and chin were pointed, black stubble cleanly shaved along the narrow corners of his jaw. He was shorter than Draco, but built long and athletic, all lean muscle and sharp lines. His shoulders and arms were layered with well proportioned contours and the outline of a few ribs could be seen below his armpit. The scars on his body were mismatched and varying in depth and color, many the width of a finger and purple, and Draco traced them with his thumb, kissing Harry's forearms before looking away. There was a severity to the angular shapes of his abdominals and hips, but his skin glowed a soft, pale, gold even in the cool winter light.  
“You done looking?” Harry asked.  
“Never,” Draco smirked, allowing Harry to pick him up by the arse and spin him as he said it.  
“Shame,” Harry whispered into his ear, laying them both flat on the sheet.

Draco flipped them in a show of lithe agility, enjoying how the chest and flat stomach tensed under him. Harry’s bulge was now difficult to ignore, and he tugged down his pants without waiting for the Griffindor to lift his hips, inching down so he was eyelevel with Harry's navel. Licking his lips and accioing lube from his dorm room, he handed the slim glass bottle to Harry before setting to work.  
He relished the feeling of firm muscle and coarse hair under his palms and moaned when he felt hands in his hair turning and manipulating his head to find a better angle. He couldn't really breath, but the rough fullness felt amazing in his throat. He loved the focus and attentiveness it required, finding excitement in the learning curve of Harry’s preferences. Running his hands up and down strong thighs, keeping to the insides where the self-induced scars were thinner and fewer, he reveled in the sounds and tastes of his partner coming undone beneath him. Draco was only just finding his rhythm, not nearly tired and rather pleased with his progress, when Harry pulled him harshly off.  
“Stop, stop. You gotta stop. How the fuck are you so good at that,” he forced out between frantic breaths.  
“I’m good at everything,” Draco answered coyly.  
He was kissing Harry soft and slow, giving them both a moment to recover, when he spoke again.  
“I’m ready I think,” he said softly, “if you want.”  
“Now?” Harry asked, clearly surprised.  
“Good a time as any,” Draco shrugged anxiously.  
Harry broke into his signature awkward grin, all of his Gryffindor bravado leaping to the surface.  
“So that’s why you summoned lube,” he joked, pulling Draco in close, “I’ve never done it this way before either,” he added more quietly, “You’ll tell me if it’s bad?”  
“You’ll be great,” Draco promised, “Just… listen, and it’ll be fine. Start with what you know.”  
“Okay,” he agreed, nuzzling Draco with his nose and rolling them over gently so Draco lay prone on his back.  
He kissed down Draco’s chest as he worked him open, sucking along his bellybutton and tickling the hair below it. He lapped around the sides of Draco’s dick, slow and frustrating and building in intensity until Draco thought he might actually pass out. Licking lower, and lower still, Draco screamed, three fingers not nearly enough but the pressure on his prostate indescribable.  
“I’m ready, I’m ready,” he pleaded, so Harry sat up to find the lube. Draco remained on his back but brought one leg over Harry’s shoulder, taking a deep breath of preparation and looking away out of fear of finishing before it started.  
It hurt like hell, but only at first. Draco was not adverse to the pain. It was strange, but gratifying, and he found himself wishing Harry would go just a little bit faster. The moment they bottomed out was magical, both still aware enough of their surroundings to be present in the moment but connected on a level neither of them could have fathomed. It was pure and beautiful and raw and more of a promise than any words ever could be, although they whispered I love you’s and sweet nothings between their kisses regardless. It filled Draco up like music with warmth and complexity, and he felt complete. Even sweeter was that somehow he knew that Harry felt the same way.  
The pace was slow and loving, each stroke deep and luxurious. Draco shifted his hips inwards, gasping as he found the perfect angle and Harry held him in place as they sped up. Butterflies danced in Draco’s groin, numbing every other sensation until he was lost in it. Everything was in limbo between bliss and ecstasy and his blood pulsed as Harry reached to squeeze him in time with their movements. His cries became shaky and impossible to control and his entire body tingled as he came, all sense of space and time abandoned for something infinitely better. Harry must have finished with him because they were collapsed in a heap, the world muted and existing only in their own heads and each other.  
“Wow,” Harry said, rolling off and casting a gentle scourgify.  
“Yeah,” Draco agreed, snuggling into Harry’s side and sighing with a satisfied smile.

Harry awoke in a state of utter contentment. The sun had moved beyond the soft filter of the trees and now bathed him in light. Harry was splayed on his back under a beech, and while frost clung to its bare branches, the warming spell Harry had lazily cast as he fell asleep was holding well. Malfoy’s knee lay heavy on Harry’s bare hip, long slender fingers pinned underneath it so that Malfoy’s entire body was wrapped rather adorably over Harry’s.  
Harry gently brushed platinum hair from his face and groped along the grass in search of his glasses. He was loath to wake Malfoy while he slept so peacefully, breath fluttering over Harry’s collarbone and eyelashes casting delicate shadows over his cheek, but the height of the sun in the sky and absence of frost on the ground was nagging at Harry. Glasses acquired, he cast a wandless tempus that had him muttering a few choice expletives and moving to shake Draco awake.  
As Malfoy’s eyes blinked open, he leaned instinctually into the hand on his back. Flipping, he stretched, and despite his urgency Harry eyed Draco’s body in the light. His ribs were dangerously prominent and his solar plexus was sunken into his chest, tugging at Harry’s throat and filling his chest with heaviness. Worse were the pink, parallel scars across his chest and navel. They drew Harry’s eyes in until he had to blink back a tear.  
Still, he found himself itching to trace the angular hip bones as they curved to create a rather obscene v and admiring how firm muscles warped and defined under pale skin. Draco was still thin, but his lunch and midnight run dates with Harry were surely paying off. He was beautiful. Harry figured he would be beautiful no matter what.  
He tore his eyes away to meet Draco’s own, which were shiny with unmasked self consciousness and warm endearment.  
“Hey.” Malfoy’s voice was low and soft in Harry’s ears. He shivered once in response and again to shake it off.  
He planted a soft kiss to Draco’s temple,  
“Jesus Dray, that’s all you got?” Harry quipped, “Were so screwed. Double transfiguration started 40 minutes ago.”  
“Shit.”  
“Yeah, shit. Think if I talk to Professor Noverto for you she’ll forget to write you up?” Harry asked meekly.  
Draco rolled his eyes,  
“Please. I’m pretty sure she wouldn't take bullshit if God himself descended from heaven and spoon fed it to her.”  
“I should have thought ahead. Set an alarm or something. I’m so sorry Draco.”  
But Malfoy’s narrow cheeks were already curving back into a smile, “I’m not.”  
“Guess we should just cut our losses then, huh? Gryffindor Common Room should be empty for another, oh,” Harry cocked his head and smirked, “hour or so. What do you say we make use.”  
They dressed in comfortable silence until, as he deftly buttoned his shirt, Draco let out a single giggle. One chuckle turned to two and soon Harry had joined in.  
“I can’t believe we did that,” he spluttered, voice pitchy with mirth, “In broad fucking daylight. On a school day.”  
“May have even been a new personal record for most rules broken at once,” Harry agreed, “And this is me we’re talking about!”  
Finally fully dressed, Harry flung his arms open to display himself.  
“Well?”  
“Gorgeous as always,” Draco answered, “Although I’m a bit surprised you're even able to dress yourself. Based on your atrocious closet choices I thought Weasley must have been doing it for you.”  
“Prat,” Harry muttered fondly, yanking at Draco’s artfully wrapped scarf and sending it crooked and askew.  
“Hey! That was low,” Malfoy hissed, stomping his foot a little for show. Harry just laughed, tossing the invisibility cloak over them as Draco struggled to right his scarf. As they set off towards the castle, Harry slipped one hand beneath Draco’s belt, pulling his shirt untucked swiftly and eliciting an undignified squeal from the blond. They jogged, clutching the cloak and jostling each other with hands sneaking under clothes to tickle and muss, as far as the castle doors, where they slowed and crouched to hide their feet.  
Stifling fits of giggles, Harry led them through the foyer and towards Gryffindor tower, taking the long way through the staircase with the trick step in order to avoid the in-use classrooms. Occasionally, they would pass a student or staff member in the hall, and when they came upon Peeves juggling brooms and swerving to avoid a pursuing Filch, Draco had to slap his palm over Harry’s mouth to quiet his laughter.  
When they finally stumbled breathless through the portrait into the Gryffindor common room, neither boy could remember being happier. They shed the cloak and Harry reached to undo Draco’s scarf. Draco batted his hands away.  
“Oh no you don’t,” he sniffed in mock offence, herding Harry backwards in order to get a hand in his hair. Harry gasped as he felt himself step on a stray shoelace (he vaguely remembered Malfoy undoing it in their struggle up the stairs) and pulled Draco with him as he fell backwards onto the carpet.  
They landed heavily with tangled legs, Draco holding himself up with one arm and protecting Harry’s head from the ground with the other.  
“Hell was that for,” he said indignantly into Harry’s ear, “you didn't have to make me fall too just because you forgot to grow a right foot."  
“But now I’m right where you want me, eh,” Harry whispered back, raising an eyebrow suggestively.  
“Mmm,” Draco’s lips were millimeters from Harry’s when they were interrupted.  
“Get the fuck off him, rat!”  
Draco froze and scrambled up, kneeing Harry in the crotch as he did. The blond paused half-way to his feet.  
“Shit you okay?”  
Harry was about to nod in reply when Draco was yanked backwards by a red-faced and horror-struck Ron Weasley. Draco stared at Harry, eyes wide and pleading, but Harry was still splayed on the floor, stiff in shock and gaping. Ron had his wand on Draco’s neck by the time Harry’s brain had caught up.  
“Ron! Calm down. It’s fine, let him go. Please!” he begged, voice cracking in desperation.  
“Fine!” Ron yelled, “Fine? Ferret Face Malfoy is in MY common room, holding MY best friend in a headlock, trying to fucking KISS him! So tell me Harry, what is fine?”  
“It’s not what it looks like! I let him in. Let him go, he’s not going to do anything.”  
Ron turned his attention abruptly back to Draco,  
“What have you done to him? Huh? Tell me or I’ll make you.”  
The Slytherins’ face was an uncharacteristic shade of beet. He looked nervous and scared.  
“Nothing okay! He didn't do anything to me!” Harry said.  
“Love potion? Imperius?” Ron cut in, “I knew you were fucking sick Malfoy but I thought you had the sense to keep it to your self.”  
“Hold on Ron. Maybe we should hear him out.”  
A new voice. Hermione had approached from the same direction as Ron. She hovered over Harry, voice shaking slightly but speaking in the assured manner of someone who had just fit in the final piece in a puzzle.  
“Just sit down Ron,” Harry said, “Do you trust me? Because if you do you have to trust me on this.”  
Ron removed his want from Draco’s throat but didn’t sit.  
“I really don’t know if I do anymore, Harry,” he sighed, “You’ve been like a ghost this whole year.”  
“You didn’t try to get me back.”  
“I wanted to. But then it seemed like you didn’t need us.”  
“I needed you before.”  
“Really?” Ron scoffed.  
Harry yanked up his sleeves in response, revealing layers and layers of uneven scars. A few had the gaping quality that indicated they had probably needed stitches. It was a low blow, emotional and impulsive, but it had the desired effect. Ron turned away, eyes sad and shameful, and Hermione gasped, brushing tears from her eyes.  
“You're better now, though.” she said.  
“Sometimes,” Harry nodded.  
“And he’s why?” she asked, gesturing to where Malfoy still stood obscured behind Ron.  
“Sit down Ron,” Harry said again.

Weasley had not been understanding. Draco hadn’t expected him to, but frankly, Draco spent very little time thinking about what Harry’s friends expected. Out of sight out of mind, he supposed. They were part of Harry and therefore part of him, but he didn’t claim to know them. Granger took the news quietly, seemingly aware that it was not her place. As far as Draco was concerned, Harry stopped being her business the moment she stopped insisting she cared. Weasley had also been quiet, but it seemed more for lack of words than lack of tactlessness. He appeared to be shaking with rage. After Harry’s brief explanation, the redhead’s stream of consciousness took over. He listed Harry’s stupidity and Draco’s misdeeds for minutes, at once managing to be incredibly immature and incredibly correct. It was enough to make even Draco half-agree with him.  
“Have you fucking lost your mind? Are you sure you weren’t obliviated? The git is a filthy fucking Death Eater. And a coward. Bloody hell, he called Hermione a mudblood for years! She was tortured! At his house! Don’t you remember?”  
“But that's not us anymore,” Harry had kept saying, “Don’t you see? We’ve been broken open and rebuilt from scratch. The air thinned and then we figured out who we really were. And this is it.”  
“I’m sorry you had to rebuild without us,” Granger said. Then she whisked Weasley through the portrait hole and Harry and Draco were left in silence.  
“Now where were we,” Harry said, arms open, and, sighing in relief, Draco snuggled in against Harry’s chest.

Draco sat attentively at his desk in Charms as Flitwick wrapped up his lecture and passed around the homework. The blond’s shoulders were squared but he was only really hearing a few of the professor’s words. His mind was busy inside the framework of his brain, collecting his thoughts and attempting to muster an air of civility and obedience. He was preparing for his weekly meeting between himself, McGonagall, and the auror in charge of his case. He usually spent said meetings in studious docility, speaking only when asked, but he longed to break the persona with an impromptu speech.  
He daydreamed of pouring his guilt out to his supervisors, rambling on about how sorry he was and how wrong he had been until they believed him and he had convinced them of how much he longed for repentance and how little he believed he deserved it. He wanted to dissolve into tears, telling them of how he starved himself because he couldn't bear the thought of taking up space, and how in his dreams he returned that space to those he had watched die.  
But he never did. He had built a cold shell around his heart and it was too thick to undo. Only Harry could see through it, and thank God for that, because Draco didn’t think himself capable of cracking it open on his own.  
“Malfoy?” The voice startled Draco from his reprieve. The room was now empty besides himself, Hermione Granger, and Ron Weasley.  
“I asked Flitwick to give us a second,” Granger continued hesitantly. Weasley was shifting with discomfort but Hermione had a determined knit in her brow. Draco looked at them, waiting for her to get to the point. He was eager to get on with his evening and wasn’t in any mood to have his focus broken.  
“Well?” he inquired.  
“We were talking it over, ”Granger started in her precocious, holier-than-thou accent, “We talked it over and we wanted to give you our blessing.”  
Draco wondered whether Weasley was on board with the “we” part of that statement.  
“Harry doesn’t want to say so, but I think it’s important to him that we, you know, believe in him.”  
“Well, I’m so pleased,” Draco drawled, voice dripping with sarcasm, “All this time I’ve been waiting for your permission and I just didn’t know it. It’s so good we’ve finally settled what Harry and I can do in our own fucking time with our own fucking lives.”  
“Don’t talk to her like that,” Weasley hissed.  
“Oh. I didn’t mean it that way,” Granger said over him, seemingly sincere, “I just wanted you to know we don’t hate you. I hope you tell Harry.”  
“Why don’t you take it up with him then,” Draco challenged. Dejected, Granger turned towards the door, Weasley trailing behind her and flipping suspicious glares over his shoulder.  
“See you Malfoy. Good luck,” she finished.  
As they went to open the door, Draco stopped them.  
“I’m only awful to you because I don’t know how to say sorry,” he said, “It’s better if you hate me. I can never make up for what I’ve done, so just let me continue to not deserve your empathy. It hurts less. I’ve got 7 years and a war of being inexcusable and sometimes I don’t want you to heal from my actions because then all of that hell will be erased. Let Harry and I be stuck in purgatory, alright! There’s nothing you can do. I’ll still be so, so goddamned sorry.”  
“Okay,” Hermione said softly, closing the classroom door behind them.  
Now that the Golden Trio knew, he expected Harry to distance himself from Draco, but the opposite proved to be true. He found himself repeatedly dragged into the company of Granger and the two youngest Weasley’s. Draco was shy around Harry’s friends, finding Hermione to be rather interesting but the other two a far bit too much. He had, through, formed an increasingly adorable bond with Crookshanks, and the cat could often be found following him in times of need, inviting Draco to bury his nose in its thick musty fur.  
The other Gryffindors were all cold towards him, shooting him suspicious glances and keeping their posture guarded but biting their tongues for Harry’s sake. Draco got the feeling that they had been walking on eggshells around the Harry since May, and we’re just happy to see him comfortable.  
Currently, Draco was sat on the edge of the brown leather couch in the Gryffindor Common Room, legs crossed and struggling to appear both ambivalent and inoffensive. When Harry lay his head on Draco’s lap, his heart sang with the display of affection, but he chanced glances around the room to sense the other's reaction. Ginny looked slightly despondent and Hermione was whispering into a fidgeting Ron’s ear.  
“Care for a game of Wizard’s Chess?” the redhead asked timidly. Draco shrugged. Twenty minutes later, he lost spectacularly.

On a windy Saturday afternoon, Harry dragged Draco to the broomshed, handing over his own firebolt and grabbing a school Cleansweep for himself, along with a quaffle and tired-looking snitch.  
“People will see us!” Draco exclaimed.  
“I don’t care,” came the reply.


	7. The Non-Linear Nature of Penance

Harry received the letter from George on the leg of a very shabby looking barn owl. He fished in his dresser for treats, the bird nearly toppling backwards from the window sill as it was handed it’s payment. Untying the letter with one hand and smoothing the mousey brown tail feathers with the other, Harry felt a pang of nostalgia for Hedwig. For a long time, losing her had been his biggest fear, but when it had finally happened it hadn’t been as bad as he had built it up to be in his head, just another straw in an agonizing load.  
The letter was all slanted scrawling print and shorthand.

"Charlie says I can’t stay here anymore. You might be the only one who gets it. Meet me Hogshead, 2pm, the 28th.  
George"

Harry read it twice before making up his mind. He had a good thing going, a reprieve from the darkness, but nothing was above the needs of his family. He was wanted for help, so he had to go. His happiness was second. Always second.  
He arrived at the Hogshead early, giving Aberforth a curt nod but refusing to meet his eye. George showed up 45 minutes late. He looked like hell, eyes sunken in and scraggly beard hiding his face. Harry barely recognized him. That was probably the intention. For all that Harry felt a stranger in his body, George appeared to think himself an intruder. His voice was hoarse and broken and he smelled of whiskey and begging for death.  
“I can’t help you,” Harry whispered, pupils dilating as something within him bent and snapped.  
“I can’t help you,” he repeated louder, avoiding George's blank eyes, “I do get it. I do and I do and I don’t deserve too.” He tossed money on the table, enough to rent a room for a week, and then apparated out of the pub.  
Tearing a messy hole through the wards around the castle, he broke through the outer gate and stumbled down the path, pressure building in the back of his head until he felt like screaming or breaking something or collapsing in place. He didn’t know how he made it inside or up the stairs to his dorm, but he did it all under the invisibility cloak, his hysteria driving him away from seeking solace in Draco or Hermione. If he was to feel it, he would fucking feel it. He wanted the hard way home. He wanted it to never go away and he wanted to take it just past too far. He wanted it to all be over. He wanted it to stop then and there and to never have happened.  
He checked his coat pocket for a blade but couldn’t find one, eventually grabbing a disposable razor from where some kid had left it on a sink. He ripped open the plastic with bare hands, cutting parallel lines deep into his thumb before finally splintering it open and extracting a thin edge from the center. He sliced at the delicate skin on the underside of his wrist, watching through blurry eyes as green veins faded from sight and were replaced by thick drops of blood. Unable to stop himself, he cried as the watery floors ran red.

Anxiety clawed at Draco’s throat, tearing him inside out and back again. There was no real reason for alarm, but something inside him felt sickeningly off. He paced feverishly, sucked entirely into his own head as his thoughts spiraled out of control. Rushing to a nearby boys room, he coughed and retched over a sink, sticking two fingers down his throat in a futile attempt to curb his rising nausea.  
Unable to take it anymore, he ran the dozen flights up to Gryffindor tower on shaky legs, blood pounding in his ears. He pounded on the door of the common room, ignorant to his surroundings even as the Fat Lady screamed and tried to swat him over the head with a wine class through the canvas.  
A very indignant Ginny Weasley opened the door for him. He was lucky it was at least someone he knew.  
“Where is Harry? Have you seen him? He was supposed to come find me after he got back but I don’t know where he went,” Draco rambled, voice harsh and pulled tight.  
“What are you do-” Ginny started., but he cut her off.  
“Jesus. Just let me in.” He shoved past her, running up the spiral stairs towards the boys dorms and beelining for the locked door of the bathroom at the end of the hall. Feeling dizzy and desperate, he rapped loudly on the door.  
“Harry, are you in there? Say something!”  
Nothing.  
“Damnit,” he muttered, “Alohomora.”  
It took 5 layers of spells but the door finally swung open, slamming against the opposite wall in Draco’s haste to get in. The scene was that of a massacre. Harry was huddled beside the showers, head buried between his knees and blood soaking every surface. His body was shaking with sobs and as he rubbed at his eyes with a hand, he left a streak of red behind. It flowed in cascades down his arms, pooling in his elbows and on the floor. The cuts were deep, lining his wrists and severing through arteries. The freshest ones were still white and spongy in the middle where they hadn’t yet begun to bleed.  
Draco ran to him, pulling Harry out of the fetal position and tearing strips from his own shirt to fashion a tourniquet.  
“Why wasn’t it me?” Harry choked into his shoulder, “I was already half gone. Instead it’s everyone else, emptied forever while I struggle to fill myself up.”  
“Without you they’d all be gone,” Draco coaxed, “Six feet under and floating around in purgatory, everything good in this world forgotten with them.”  
“Purgatory’s a much nicer place than here,” Harry said miserably.  
“They would have missed you too,” he whispered into coarse dark hair, breathing in the warmth to block out the metallic scent that hung in the air, “They love you. They love you regardless.”  
“That’s the worst part.”  
“Let me hold you,” he begged, and the brunette did, leaning against Draco as he succumbed to a new bout of tears.  
“Just trust me. Trust us.”  
“Maybe.” Harry’s eyes unfocused and he slipped from consciousness just as Hermione and Ginny rushed in to help carry him to the hospital wing.

Draco’s eyes had started to droop by the time Harry woke. It took him a second to hear the boy start to speak, but when he did, relief flooded him and he released a breath, bittersweet joy quickly overflowing through his eyes.  
“You can’t fix me,” Harry started, “Sometimes people think they love someone, you know, but really they just can’t figure out how to love themselves, so they think if they try to fix someone else it will make them feel worthy again. But it doesn't work like that.”  
Draco didn't respond.  
“So I just wanted to say, that, er, you have to tell me,” Harry continued, “If you feel that, you know, with me. I’d rather know sooner than later.”  
Draco shook his head before he could even process what Harry had said. He noticed he was still clutching Harry’s hand in both of his.  
“No,” his voice sounded surprisingly steady.  
“I thought so. I thought maybe that’s what I was feeling. But then I thought I’d lost you. Harry, my whole world imploded. I was incomplete. I love you. I think I really love you.”  
Draco’s was smiling now. Shivering too.  
“I’m sorry,” Harry said, and then he pulled Draco down for a sweet, slow kiss.

They sat side by side in the grass outside the quidditch pitch, facing out towards the lake. The sky was dark and their faces were lit only by a silver moon hanging high in the sky. The first buds of spring were visible in the trees, but everything was tucked in on itself to protect from the night time chill. The air was still and silent, leaving Harry and Draco entirely alone with each other.  
“We’re never going to be all good, are we?” Draco asked into the darkness, “It’s never going to be perfect.”  
“No,” Harry replied, shaking his head thoughtfully, “There are just some things that can’t be made whole again.” He paused.  
“But I’m glad for it. We couldn’t be happy all the time. Then we wouldn’t be people, we’d be game show hosts.”  
Draco giggled, “I love that movie.”  
“Life’s complicated,” Harry continued, “We’re complicated. That’s what makes it work.”  
“I know,” Draco whispered, “We’re going to be okay.”  
Harry took Draco’s hand, squeezing it once and then again.  
“I think we are.”

The End


End file.
